How to Gift a Special Gift?
By JS Singh

What makes your gift special is your thought behind it. Have you really considered the person you are buying gift for? Have you considered the occasion you are gifting on? Have you considered the importance of the occasion to the person? Answer these questions before you buy a gift.

If you want your gift to be special, you need to go an extra bit and buy a gift that means a lot to the person who is going to receive the gift. Special gifts are not about buying expensive gifts. Anybody with money can do that. In fact, for a gift to be special, it need not be expensive at all.

Let me give you an example. Let's say you are gifting your friend on his birthday. This friend of yours has been talking about starting on his own. However, he has not been able to take a decision due to lack of guidance. What should you get for him? You could perhaps get an expensive gadget for him. Or you could get him the biography of Richard Branson that talks about his entrepreneurial journey and a note saying how much you wish him to succeed. What do you think your friend will appreciate? Your friend will appreciate the shirt. But he will be completely touched by the book and your note. He will always remember your thought behind the book.

This is what I mean by making your gift special. You need to make sure that you have kept the interests of the recipient in mind while selecting a gift. Give it a personal touch and you have got a very special gift.

This article is just a starting point of a discussion that has many interesting and important aspects on the art of gifting.

If you want to know more about gifting and making your gifts special, you can follow this link to my site where I will be posting further articles: Buying Special Gifts for Loved Ones

JS Singh writes about the art of gifting. You can find more articles by him by visiting his blogsite: Buying Special Gifts for loved ones

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Mother's Day Tradition and Gifts
By Hollie Souza

Mothers have been celebrated and thanked in festivals since the time of ancient Greeks and Romans. Then, it was a celebration in springtime, when the earth was renewed by blooming flowers and budding trees. The mother goddess was thanked for providing crops and the fertile ground on which they were grown upon during lengthy festivals and ceremonies. Women, who personally embodied the goddess energy and spirit, were centered in these celebrations.

Much later, during the beginning centuries of Christianity, the celebration of mothers took a different meaning. While still honoring mothers, the festivities took on a much more somber and pious context. Early Christians had replaced the pagans' celebrations for the earth goddesses with a celebration honoring the Virgin Mary and her mothering of Jesus Christ.

The British continued the Christian tradition of honoring their mums, with their own holiday, Mothering Day. Celebrated in the forth Sunday of Lent, Mothering Day was held to honor moms. It was a day on which laborers were given a day away from their seven days a week duties to go home and spend the day with their families. Most honored the day by bringing their mom's small Mothering Day cakes. With the settling of America, most of the British discontinued their observation of Mothering Day.

Mother's Day did not become an official American holiday until 1914. President Woodrow Wilson declared the second Sunday of May to be known as Mother's Day for the entire nation. There is much debate, however, of where the American origins started and who deserves credit for the holiday being recognized.

There are several groups who should be credited with their efforts in establishing a national day for mothers. Julia Ward Howe, an American Civil War activist, attended several international peace conferences to institute a "mother's day of peace" after witnessing the carnage of the Franco-Prussian War in the 1870's and American Civil War in the 1860's. Howe instituted the Mothers' Peace Day in Boston, Massachusetts, which was to be celebrated annually on the second Sunday in June for a minimum of ten years, as a means to unite women against war. Her efforts were the start of a push for a national holiday.

A lot of Howe's efforts were built upon the work already completed by Ann Marie Reeves Jarvis, a woman in the Appalachians who, in 1858, began to call attention to the need for improved sanitation through the implementation of a "Mothers Friendship Day". After the Civil War, she taught local women nursing basics and proper sanitation, thereby improving the lives of thousands.

Jarvis' daughter, Anna Jarvis, was the woman who successfully accomplished having a national holiday for mom. After the death of her mother in 1905, Anna started her campaign to start the holiday. On May 10, 1908, the first official observation of Mother's Day occurred during a church service in the Andrew's Methodist Church in Grafton, West Virginia. After this, the popularity of the yearly event grew across the country until it became a national holiday on May 9, 1914.

The first Mother's Day was celebrated by the giving of carnations, during a church service, to moms. White carnations were given for living mommies and red carnations were given in memory of those who had passed. Since then, mothers day gift have expanded to jewelry, candy, candles, and flowers. Mother's Day is now celebrated all across the world.

Hollie Rougeaux Souza, owner and jewelry designer for http://www.bebeclaire.com, a Jewelery and Accessories Boutique for Baby, Child, and Adult. Specializing in baby name bracelets, mother jewelry, hand-fired and engraved 99.9% pure silver pendants and charms, sterling silver, Swarovski and Czech crystal jewelry, 14kt gold accent jewelry, personalized jewelry, and custom items.

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